| Ameesha Patel |
'I am a frequent flier and deserve
respect as a passenger'
Ameesha Patel is in no mood to take the humiliation she suffered at the airport lying down
Ram Kamal Mukherjee
Ameesha Patel must have never imagined her New York trip would turn out to be such a nightmare when she was accused of high-handed behaviour and mouthing profanity to airline officials when she requested to be upgraded.
When contacted Ameesha said, "When I requested the Air India official to upgrade the tickets, the lady at the counter was very rude and said, 'what do you think of yourself?' When I asked her not to raise her voice, she simply refused to listen."
Incidentally, there was also a drunken passenger, who joined in this verbal fight. "There was man who was standing behind me and looking for trouble. In his drunken state he joined hands with the airport official and they both started using abusive language," she says.
Finally, Ameesha and Sejal Shah, the friend she was traveling with lost their temper and went up to the officer on duty, Ayub Khan. "He just stood and watched the entire tamasha," says a source. This incident has taken its toll on the actress who sounded very tired. "I didn't get the time to take a nap. I am shocked with what has happened in India. I think they have blown this entire issue out of proportion."
Then she continues, "I am a frequent flier and I deserve respect as a passenger. In fact, we were planning to file a complaint against them for rude behaviour. But they assured that such incidents won't happen again, so I excused them. Now they are only trying to safeguard themselves by filing a false complaint against us. In fact we kept on telling the ground staff (Ayub Khan) about the drunken man's misbehaviour and they didn't even do anything about that. Is this the way to deal with passengers? I have travelled globally since my teen years for my education and professional purposes. I have never encountered such an incident in my life."
When asked about mouthing obscenities and threatening to complain to Minister Praful Patel, Ameesha says, "I have never used abusive language. I have lived my life with dignity and I don't need to threaten people or name drop, that's cheap," she says.
